THE New York Times AND Atlantic Writer Jerusalem Demsas recently published articles about how the YIMBY (“Yes in My Backyard”) movement has crossed ideological and partisan lines in an era when such divisions have overwhelmed most other political issues. Times the headline calls it “The Surprising Left-Right Alliance That Wants More Suburban Apartments”:
For years, the Yimbytown conference was an ideologically safe space where young liberal professionals could talk to other young liberal professionals about the particular problems of cities with many young liberal professionals: lack of bike lanes and public transportation, too many restrictive zoning laws ….
But the vibe and crowd were surprisingly different at this year’s meet, which was held at the University of Texas at Austin in February. In addition to vegan lunches and nametags with preferred pronouns, the conference included – and even celebrated – a group that had until recently been unwelcome: red-state Republicans.
The first day featured a speech on changing zoning laws from Greg Gianforte, Montana’s Republican governor, who last year signed a housing package that YIMBYs now call “the Montana Miracle…”
Day two began with a panel on solutions to rising real estate costs in Texas. One of the speakers was a Republican legislator from Texas who, in addition to being a supporter of loosening land-use regulations, pushed for a near-total ban on abortions.
Anyone who missed these discussions could have instead gone to the panel on bipartisanship where Republican housing reformers from Arizona and Montana spoke with a Democratic state senator from Vermont. Or I noticed the list of sponsors, which, in addition to foundations like Open Philanthropy and Arnold Ventures, included conservative and libertarian organizations like the Mercatus Center, the American Enterprise Institute, and the Pacific Legal Foundation.
Demsas makes similar observations:
Over the past four years, as the affordability crisis has worsened, YIMBYs have gained ground. In conservative Montana, an anti-California message pushed lawmakers to pass pro-development bills; in Washington State, ambitious proposals have been passed in the name of affordability and racial equity. But members face pressure from both sides to abandon ship. How long can they last?
One reason the YIMBY movement has remained bipartisan is that it is decentralized. But the group gathers periodically for a national conference amusingly called “YIMBYtown,” the rare place where you might find socialists, centrist economists, and Trump-supporting elected officials all in the same room, working toward the same goal.
I have been writing about inter-ideological agreements on this issue for years. Housing deregulation is a cause that unites a wide range of economists and land use experts from across the political spectrum. Therefore, I, a libertarian scholar of property rights, find myself in the same boat with liberals like Richard Kahlenberg and Paul Krugman and conservatives at the same time. National review.
Prominent political supporters of zoning reform include Republican Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin and Democratic Colorado Governor Jared Polis. Governor Polis captured the broad appeal of real estate deregulation when he recently stated that “[i]It is a solution to housing costs that embraces our individual property rights…. The fact that it fills a real need that people from left to right, to center, no matter where they are politically, want to do something about high real estate costs is really what makes it even more important.”
In the near future Texas law review In an article, Josh Braver and I explain why the constitutional case against exclusionary zoning can also cross ideological lines. I am a libertarian originalist; Braver is a living progressive constitutionalist. But we both agree that exclusive zoning violates the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment.
Of course, the opposing side in this debate – the NIMBY (“Not in My Backyard”) forces – also cuts across ideological lines. It includes leftists suspicious of capitalism and development, and rightists – including Donald Trump – who exploit fears that deregulation will lead to more poor people and minorities moving into white suburban neighborhoods. There are also many NIMBYs who believe – contrary to basic economics – that allowing developers to build more housing will actually increase costs rather than increase them. Others who fear this will reduce property values and change the “character” of their neighborhoods. For some progressive homeowners in the latter camp, narrow self-interest trumps ideology. In fact, many existing homeowners have a lot to gain from housing deregulation, especially if they have children. But many don’t know this, are highly risk averse, or both.
If I were to speculate about what really unites YIMBYs across the political spectrum and divides them from their opponents, I would suggest that a major factor is that YIMBYs generally understand Economics 101 and apply it to housing issues. They know that increasing supply by allowing more construction reduces costs and therefore also increases the availability of homes, especially for the poor and disadvantaged. NIMBYs, on the other hand, tend to ignore or deny it.
More generally, YIMBYs are less likely than NIMBYs to see the economy as a zero-sum game in which some people can only gain at the expense of others. Therefore, they recognize that letting developers build more housing and letting more people “move to opportunity” benefits not only the developers and migrants themselves, but also the rest of society, which has much to gain from the resulting boost in productivity and ‘innovation. Zero-sum thinking underlies many political divisions and likely plays a significant role here as well.
I do not argue that zero-sum thinking and economic ignorance are the only factors at play. As I have pointed out previously, you can be a highly informed and logically coherent NIMBY if you are highly risk averse and place the preservation of your neighborhood’s current “character” above concerns such as protecting property rights, creating opportunities for the poor, and increase growth and innovation. But NIMBYism would be a much less powerful political force if it were limited to people who think this way.
For the moment, YIMBYism remains a valuable cross-ideological coalition, which has managed to achieve some important successes, although it has also suffered some setbacks. It remains to be seen whether he can continue to challenge the forces of polarization.